


Root Rot

by brsb4hls



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley-centric (Good Omens), Guilt, M/M, No Smut, Non-Graphic Violence, POV Crowley (Good Omens), Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Revenge, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), animal forms, flower shop, mild body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-24 20:15:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20711888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brsb4hls/pseuds/brsb4hls
Summary: Crowley's flower shop is always dirty and his flat is always cold.His past catches up with him.





	Root Rot

**Author's Note:**

> *Not what you might expect at first, probably, please be mindfull of the tags
> 
> *Tagged mature since the violence is mostly hinted at and there is no smut, but the theme feels a bit too dark for me to tag it T.  
Let me know if you think I tagged incorrectly, I'll change it.
> 
> * My favorite trope, that I can't mention here cause spoilers...let me know what you think :)

*

Something’s not right with his flowers.  
Crowley can feel it.  
They smell different, richer, sweeter, but in an unpleasant way.  
They’re still afraid, but not of him.

Crowley turns. He turns again, scans his small shop. Everything seems to be into place.  
The till on the counter, the flowers on the shelves, the pots on the floor.  
The small old-fashioned bell above the shop door.  
It chimes.  
The sound seems muffled, barely reaching Crowley’s ears.

A woman enters, soft, warm, floating.  
Her coat is white.  
It spreads behind her.  
She approaches Crowley, holding up a small, light blue pot.  
It drips.

„Something’s wrong with it“  
she says.

Crowley looks down at the plant inside the pot.  
It appears familiar, but Crowley can’t remember the species.  
It’s red petals are curled up into eachother, themselves, some of them have black spots.  
They look like they’re charred.

„I’m sorry“ Crowley says.  
"You shouldn’t have bought it here.“

The woman looks desperate.  
Her eyes fill with tears.

„Don’t cry“  
Crowley begs.  
„It’s my fault. I didn’t take proper care of it.  
I shouldn’t have sold it like this.“

„You have to fix it“  
the woman demands.

„I can’t. You have to let it wilt. I’m sorry“  
Crowley whispers.

Crowley vaguely senses nausea creeping up at him.  
He feels weak, ashamed.  
He failed.  
He sinks to the floor and curls in on himself, dryheaving.

When he looks up, he is alone.

The plant in the blue pot sits on the counter.

At home, Crowley draws himself a bath.  
He needs to get warm.  
His place is cold, probably because it’s so big.  
Crowley wonders what he thought he needed all the space for. 

Crowley had tried to turn on the heater, but he couldn’t find one.  
He wanted to investigate about that, search his place, reread his lease.

A flat has to have heaters.

But it’s too cold.  
Crowley can’t think.  
He is shaking, theeth clacking against each other.  
Bath first. 

Steam billows up from the tub.  
Crowley waves his hands through it.  
There’s no sensation.

Crowley faintly notices a smell, sharp, dark, stinging.  
Something must have burnt.  
Probably his dinner, he must have forgotten it on the stove.  
What did he make for dinner?  
Crowley can’t remember. 

He gets into the tub.  
It’s cold.

The shop looks the same.  
It still feels wrong.  
Crowley tries to tend to his flowers.  
He keeps getting distracted. 

Customers come in.  
Crowley really can’t concentrate on their faces, after a while, they all look blurred. 

Crowley has a headache.  
He thinks it must be a headache, he can’t be certain. 

Sometimes it appears to be there, right behind his eyelids, throbbing wetly, clouding his vision.  
Then it’s gone.

There are complaints about his flowers.  
Crowley apologizes, but nobody listens to him.

Shame raises up again in him, deep and red.  
It climbs right up into his chest and presses.  
Crowley gasps. 

A young man comes up to him.

„You deserve this“ he says.

His hands are full of decomposed leaves.  
He lets them drop in front of Crowley.

„You shouldn’t have touched them“  
he says.

There’s a rustling sound behind Crowley and he slowley turns around.  
A shimmering black tail vanishes between terracotta pots.  
Crowley drops to his knees and slowley crawls over to the spot where he saw it.

There’s nothing there.  
Just empty pots.

Crowley sits back on his heels and raises his hands, turns them over.  
His palms are covered in grime.  
He needs to clean the floor he figures.

Crowley doesn’t want to go home.  
It will be cold there, he knows.

He searches for a pub.  
They all seem to be closed.  
Finally he finds an open one.  
Walking up to it, Crowley peers trough a window.  
The inside is bathed in red light.  
People are drinking and smoking.  
Crowley doesn’t hear them through the glass.  
He tries for the door.  
A heavyset man with a beard stops him, frowning.

„You can’t go in there“ he says.  
„There has been a fire.“

Crowley can’t remember how he got home, but he is cold again.  
The flat still smells of his burnt dinner and there’s water on the boards.  
Crowley figures he needs to clean the floor.  
He searches for a mop.  
There’s one in the bathroom.  
Crowley takes it out and starts to gently move it over the ground. 

„It wont work like that“  
the woman in the white coat says sadly.

„You have to pick up the leaves and petals first“.

Crowley looks around himself.  
The floor of his shop is covered in dead flora.

The woman walks over and lays a hand on Crowley’s shoulder.  
It burns.  
And it is pressing him down. 

Crowley shakes himself.  
Satiny sheets slide off his body and to the floor.  
His bed is still freezing.  
He tries to pick up the sheets again, but they slip through his fingers, again and again, falling onto the wet floor.

The coffee tastes like iron.  
The machine must be rusty.  
Everything is.  
The shop is old. 

Crowley is repotting.  
He buries his hands in fresh soil.  
It should smell like hope, like birth.  
It smells like rot, like desperation.

Gently, reverently Crowley puts the fragile green seedling into it’s new home.

„You’re poisoning it“ a customer says.

Crowley starts to cry.

He thinks he does. 

His shoulders are shaking, his chest is heaving, his eyes are burning.

„I’m sorry“  
he whispers.  
"I am so sorry.“

Blinking through his tears Crowley sees something move in the corner of his vision.

He wipes his eyes.

A bird, right in front of the shop door.  
Greyish, fluffed up.  
A white ring around his neck.  
A wood pigeon.

It cocks it’s head expectantly, flutters it’s wings.  
Crowley creeps towards it, on hands and knees.  
When he reaches it, it takes off, swiftly flying out of the open shop door.  
Crowley stumbles after it.

When he gets out of the door, he starts to shake again.  
His flat is still cold.  
The floor is still wet.  
It still smells like something has burnt.

Crowley wails.

He stumbles through his flat.  
The bathroom with the filled tub, steam rising from the water, but no heat.  
The empty bed with the freezing sheets, too heavy to pick up.  
The kitchen.  
Crowley has to find the kitchen.

He follows the smell until he’s standing in front of a wall of fire.  
The icy cold of it chills him to his core.  
His heart begins to stutter.

Crowley backs away from the flames, wants to turn and run. 

There’s a small shadow, moving inside the blood red, glowing orange.  
It’s grey.  
It’s fluttering it’s wings invitingly.

There are petals in it’s beak.  
They’re not wilted.  
They smell like spring. 

Crowley can sense it through the stinging scent of fire.

The wood pigeon seems to weirdly hover in place, bright blue pin eyes fixated on Crowley.  
Wings moving up and down, inside the fire.

Crowley blinks.  
The flames are curling around the bird, but not touching it.

They touch the petals in it’s beak.  
They slowley start to singe, char around the edges.

Crowley feels a searing pain, shooting through his whole body.

„No!“ he screams desperatly, barging into the flames, reaching for the small bird.

The icy flames are burning him. 

He feels his conciousness slip and his eyes close.  
His hands are clenching around soft feathers. 

Then fingers. 

He throws up.  
Something dark and sulfury, gooey and suffocating forces it’s way out if his throat. 

Crowley doesn’t want to see it.  
He keeps his eyes shut.

Something warm and wet drips onto his hands.  
It stings lightly.  
The sting feels soothing.

Something is in his hair.  
A hand.  
It strokes.  
There’s a faint sound, somewhere in the distance.  
It could be music.

Crowley tries to concentrate on it.  
There seem to be words.

„Please, please I’m begging you…“

Crowley forces his eyes open.

There’s no fire.  
He is lying somewhere, a bed probably.  
The room is warm.  
It must be a room, there are walls. And books. A window. So many books.

Crowley slowley turns his head. It hurts, he faintly registers.

Aziraphale is sitting beside him, cradling him in his arms.  
His clothes are wet with sweat, tears and tarry black vomit.

There’s a look in his eyes Crowley never saw before.  
It’s hurt, despair, fiery rage and love, so deep and burning that Crowley has to look away.

Aziraphale sobs, inhales.

„You wouldn’t come back“ he whispers.

„If you wouldn’t have come back…“

He pulls Crowley into his arms, crushing him.  
Crowley whimpers, clutching at his arms.  
They hold each other.

„Are you real“  
Crowley asks.  
He knows, he’s not cold anymore.  
He needs to hear it still.

„Yes, dearest, yes I’m real“.

„Show me“ Crowley begs.

Aziraphale presses his lips to his mouth.  
Crowley feels softness and warmth.  
He tastes his own sick and forces himself to pull back.

His mind is still fuzzy.  
Crowley tries to take in his surroundings.

He’s in Aziraphale’s room, above the bookshop, in his bed.  
He’s hurting, he realizes.

Crowley lifts the blanket that’s covering him and looks down on himself.  
There’s a burn wound on his chest, starting to heal. New skin is forming, mixed with scales.  
The rest of his body is slipping on the sheets, writhing. Dithering between dimensions to cope with the hurt. There’s a long black tail, coiling around one leg.  
Fingers with claws, fingers without them.  
One too pointy tongue end.

Crowley looks at Aziraphale questioningly.

The angel swallows.  
It takes a while.

„They came after you“ he finally says.  
„Demons.“

Aziraphale shivers with rage and disgust.

„Rogue ones, I figure. Noone sent them, I was able to find out that much. Had their own agenda I presume.  
They ambushed you, you couldn’t fight them off…“

Crowley starts to remember.  
They trapped him, hurt him from outside the sigil.

Aziraphale exhales.  
„When I saw what they were about to do to you I…I couldn’t, Crowley. I couldn’t let them hurt you. I couldn’t let them take you from me.“

Crowley shivers.  
He sees it again, inside of his mind.  
That violent glow radiating from inside the angel. Heavenly wrath, barely contained inside it’s too small vessel, leaking out, burning it’s way towards the demons in roaring blue flames, obliterating them completely.  
Leaving only ash.

Crowley hears Aziraphale sob.

„I didn’t even touch you, but you were too close. Oh Crowley I didn’t mean…I couldn’t control my rage, I am so sorry.  
I got you hurt and then you wouldn’t wake up. I tried to heal you, love, I tried to reach you. I tried everything, but you couldn’t hear me.“

Crowley takes Aziraphales hand, lifts it, presses it to his lips.

„You did reach me“  
he whispers. „You brought me back.“

Crowley lets go of Aziraphale's hand, slumps back. 

„Angel“  
he starts, but he can’t speak.  
His throat closes up, desperate tremors are wrecking his body.  
Crowly is crying, curling in on himself

Aziraphale tries to hold him.

Crowley pushes him off.

„I’m so sorry“ Aziraphale says again. 

There’s hurt in his voice.  
And shame.

That’s not right.  
It’s not his fault.  
Crowley has to tell him.  
He sits upright, sobbing and shaking, forcing out words.

„No angel, no…not…not that…not you, never you. Love you, so much…“  
he wipes his eyes, doesn’t look up.

„The demons“ he tries.  
"New ones, young ones…souls I corrupted, souls I tempted. It’s my fault angel, I deserved it, I did…I made them…I made them wrong.“

There’s silence.  
Then a sound and a rush of air.  
Warm wings are encircling Crowley, holding him. Refusing to let him go.

He struggles, shaking and whimpering.  
The wings hold him close.

Crowley cries until he falls asleep.  
He doesn’t dream.

When he wakes up, Aziraphale is beside him, holding him in his arms.  
The angel is wearing an oldfashioned nightshirt.  
His wings are still out, hovering protectively above the bed.

Crowley squirms in his arms.  
Aziraphale holds him tighter.

„It’s not your fault“  
he whispers against Crowley’s head.  
„Hell made you do it, you couldn’t help it.“

„Still my fault“  
Crowley protests, lying still now.

Aziraphale presses a kiss to his cheek.

„It’s like root rot“ he says, softly.

"It starts down there and it just spreads. Contaminating everything.  
You suffered from it too. It almost ate you up.  
You’re not responsible for passing it on.  
You managed to cut it off now, which means you can heal.“

Crowley exhales shakily.

„Will you help me?“ he asks timidly.

„Of course“ Aziraphale says, kissing his lips.

***

Crowley burries his fingers in fresh soil.  
He digs around in it, savoring all the different sensations around him.  
The sun burning down on his red hair, the breeze, smelling faintly of the sea, the warm, moist dirt in his hands.

„Oh those look so lovely“  
a voice calls out above him.

Crowley lifts his sunglass covered eyes.  
They are met with the sight of a warm brown corderoy dress.  
He peeks up further into a bright, friendly face with sparkling green eyes and full lips, framed by tousled,dirty blonde locks.

He grins.

„Thank you, Margie“ he says.

„You’re very welcome, Anthony. I love daffodils and your’s are so bright, they light up the whole street. Your whole garden just looks amazing. How do you do that?“

„Gotta give ‚em lots of special care“ Crowley winks.

Margies blushes slightly and beams.

„I hope you’re not flirting with me, we’re both married after all“ she tuts teasingly.

Crowley places a dirty hand over his heart.  
„I would never“ he mock swears.

Margie giggles.

„Say, would you and your husband like to come over later this afternoon? I’m making stew and it’s always too much?“

„Absolutely, Margie, thank you. I can guarantee you though, it’s never too much for Aziraphale"  
Crowley jokes, wiggling his eyebrows.

Margie huffs a laugh.

„Ain’t that the truth. I don’t know how you manage to feed him, you should grow more vegetables, probs.“

„M starting a patch of zucchini in the back“,  
Crowley answers, throwing a thumb over his shoulder.

Later, Crowley and Aziraphale will visit Margie and her husband Jacob.  
Her third and finally the right one.

Crowley will bring Margie daffodil bulbs, that will grow into the brightest flowers in the street and Aziraphale will secretely bless Jacob’s injured hip.

They will eat stew, drink wine and gossip about the neighbours.

Crowley likes visiting Margie.

Her house is always warm and it smells of fresh apples.

*******


End file.
